With all this new information gathered from research and scientific studies, it is time for society to accept that pornography is harmful. Science and research are showing us how porn harms the brain, damages relationships, and negatively affects society as a whole.

Here are just fifteen reasons why porn is anything but harmless entertainment. If you’d like to learn and read more in-depth about a specific reason, and see more empirical sources on the issue, click the image associated with each one. After all, knowledge is power in this fight against porn.

1. Porn Can Change & Rewire Your Brain

Believe it or not, studies show that those of us who make more frequent use of pornography have brains that are less connected, less active, and even smaller in some areas. [1] Thanks to modern science, now we know that the brain goes on changing throughout life, [2] constantly rewiring itself and laying down new nerve connections, and that this is particularly true in our youth. [3]

There’s some pretty fierce competition between brain pathways, and those that don’t get used enough will likely be replaced. [4] Use it or lose it, as they say. Only the strong survive.

That’s where porn comes in.

Porn happens to be fantastic at forming new, long-lasting pathways in the brain. In fact, porn is such a ferocious competitor that hardly any other activity can compete with it, including actual sex with a real partner. [5] That’s right, porn can actually overpower your brain’s natural ability to have real sex! Why? As Dr. Norman Doidge, a researcher at Columbia University, explains, porn creates the the perfect conditions and triggers the release of the right chemicals to make lasting changes in your brain. [6]

2. A Porn Habit Can Escalate Into Twisted Territory

Like any potentially addictive substance, porn triggers the release of dopamine into a part of the brain called the reward center (a.k.a. reward pathway or system). [7] Basically, the reward center’s job is to make you feel good whenever you do something healthy, like eating a great meal, having sex, or getting a good workout. [8] The “high” you get makes you want to repeat the behavior again and again. [9] (See Why Porn Is Like a Drug) Your brain is hardwired to motivate you to do things that will improve your health and chance of survival. [10]

Porn is an escalating behavior because as some users develop tolerance, the porn that used to excite them starts to seem boring. [11] Predictably, they often try to compensate by spending more time with porn and/or seeking out more hardcore material in an effort to regain the excitement they used to feel. [12] Many users find themes of aggression, violence, and increasingly “edgy” acts creeping into their porn habits and fantasies. [13] But no matter how shocking their tastes become, you can bet there will be pornographers waiting to sell it to them.

3. Porn Can Be Addictive

Research shows that of all the forms of online entertainment—like gambling, gaming, surfing, and social networking—porn has the strongest tendency to be addictive. [14]

When porn enters the brain, it triggers the reward center (like we talked about before) to start pumping out dopamine, which sets off a cascade of chemicals including a protein called DeltaFosB. [15] DeltaFosB’s regular job is to build new nerve pathways to mentally connect what you’re doing (i.e. the porn you watch) to the pleasure you feel. [16] Those strong new memories outcompete other connections in the brain, making it easier and easier to return to porn. [17] (See How Porn Changes The Brain.)

As porn users become desensitized from repeated overloads of dopamine, they often find they can’t feel normal without a dopamine high. [18] Some report feeling anxious or down until they can get back to their porn. [19] As they delve deeper into the habit, their porn of choice often turns increasingly hard-core. [20] And many who try to break their porn habits report finding it “really hard” to stop. [21]

If this sounds like the classic symptoms of addiction, well….the head of the United States’ National Institute on Drug Abuse agrees. [22]

4. Porn Can Heavily Affect Your Sexual Tastes

The reward center (like we’ve talked about before) is usually a pretty great thing. Normally, our brain attracts us to healthy behaviors and encourages us to form life-supporting habits. [23] But when those reward chemicals get connected to something harmful, it has the opposite effect.

Porn users may think they’re just being entertained by sexually explicit content, but their brains are busy at work building connections between their feelings of arousal and whatever’s happening on their screen. [24] And since porn users typically become accustomed to the porn they’ve already seen and have to constantly move on to more extreme forms of pornography to get aroused, [25] the kind of porn a user watches usually changes over time. [26] (See Porn is an Escalating Behavior.)

In a survey of 1,500 young adult men, 56% said their tastes in porn had become “increasingly extreme or deviant.” [27] Just like the rats, many porn users eventually find themselves getting aroused by things that used to disgust them or that go against what they think is morally right. [28] In many cases, porn users find their tastes so changed that they can no longer respond sexually to their actual partners, though they can still respond to porn. [29]

Once users start watching extreme and dangerous sex acts, things that were disgusting or morally shameful can start to seem normal, acceptable, and more common than they really are. [30] One study found that people exposed to significant amounts of porn thought things like sex with animals and violent sex were twice as common as what those not exposed to porn believed. [31] And when people believe a behavior is normal, they’re more likely to try it. [32]

5. Porn Can Affect Your Brain (Similar To A Drug)

Researchers have found that Internet porn and addictive substances like tobacco have very similar effects on the brain, [33] and they are significantly different from how the brain reacts to healthy, natural pleasures like food or sex. [34] Think about it. When you’re munching a snack or enjoying a romantic encounter, eventually your cravings will drop and you’ll feel satisfied. Why? Because your brain has a built-in “off” switch for natural pleasures. “Dopamine cells stop firing after repeated consumption of a ‘natural reward’ (e.g. food or sex),” explains Nora Volkow, Director of The National Institute of Drug Abuse. [35] But addictive drugs go right on increasing dopamine levels without giving the brain a break. [36] The more a drug user hits up, the more dopamine floods his brain, and the stronger his urges are to keep using. That’s why drug addicts find it so hard to stop once they take the first hit. “[O]ne hit may turn into many hits, or even a lost weekend.” [37]

What else has the power to keep pumping dopamine endlessly into the brain? If you’ve ever sat in front of a computer screen for hours in a porn trance, you already know the answer.

6. Porn Can Damage Your Sex Life

Doctors are seeing an epidemic of young men who, because of their porn use, can’t get an erection with a real, live partner. [38]

Study after study has shown that porn is directly related to problems with arousal, attraction, and sexual performance. [39]. Porn leads to less sex and to less sexual satisfaction within a relationship. [40] Researchers have shown a strong connection between porn use and low sex drive, erectile dysfunction, and trouble reaching orgasm. [41] Many frequent porn users reach a point where they have an easier time getting aroused by Internet porn than by having actual sex with a real partner. [42] One recent study even concluded that porn use was likely the reason for low sexual desire among a random sample of high school seniors. [43] Who ever heard of that? Low sexual desire among high school seniors!

This trend of sex problems is especially serious for teens and young adults. Their brains are particularly vulnerable to being rewired by porn, [44] and they are in a period where they are forming crucial attitudes, preferences, and expectations for their future. [45]

7. Porn Is Full Of Lies

Sex is natural and normal. Porn is something entirely different.

Make no mistake, porn is a product. Pornographers have a lot to gain by driving traffic to their sites, so they dress up their product to grab your attention. That “dressing up” is exactly what makes porn so unnatural.

Professional porn actors have a whole team of people to make every detail look perfect, from directing and filming to lighting and makeup, maybe even a plastic surgeon or two to thank. With some careful editing, a typical 45 minute porn flick that took three days to shoot can appear to have happened all at once, without a break. Film the right bodies from the right angles at the right moments, edit out all the mistakes, Photoshop away any imperfections, add a catchy soundtrack, and you have something most definitely NOT like “natural” sex with “normal” people.

Porn also makes it look like no matter what a man does, the woman likes it even though so many of the sex acts shown in porn are degrading, painful or violent. And these are just a couple of the countless lies porn sells.

8. Porn Can Damage Love

Research shows that pornography use is linked to less stability in relationships, [46] increased risk of infidelity, [47] and greater likelihood of divorce. [48] Men who are exposed to porn find their partners less sexually attractive and rate themselves as less in love with their partners. [49] A recent study tracked couples over a six year period, from 2006 to 2012, to see what factors influenced the quality of their marriage and their satisfaction with their sex lives. The researchers found that of all the factors considered, porn use was the second strongest indicator that a marriage would suffer. [50] Not only that, but the marriages that were harmed the most were those of men who viewed porn heavily, once a day or more. [51]

Why do porn users struggle so much in real life relationships? The science is pretty clear.

Research shows that porn users report less love and trust in their relationships, are more prone to separation and divorce, and often see marriage as a “constraint.” [52] Overall, they are less committed to their partners, [53] less satisfied in their relationships, [54] and more cynical about love and relationships in general. [55] They also have poorer communication with their partners and are more likely to agree that, in their own relationships, “little arguments escalate into ugly fights with accusations, criticisms, name-calling, and bringing up past hurts.” [56]

And if all that weren’t enough, porn also ruins a couple’s sex life. [57]

9. Porn Can Leave You Lonely

“The more one uses pornography, the more lonely one becomes,” says Dr. Gary Brooks, a psychologist who has worked with porn addicts for the last 30 years. [58] “Any time [a person] spends much time with the usual pornography usage cycle, it can’t help but be a depressing, demeaning, self-loathing kind of experience.” [59] The worse people feel about themselves, the more they seek comfort wherever they can get it. Normally, they would be able to rely on the people closest to them to help them through their hard times—a partner, friend, or family member. But most porn users aren’t exactly excited to tell anyone about their porn habits, least of all their partner. So they turn to the easiest source of “comfort” available: more porn.

10. Porn Can Hurt Your Partner

Studies have shown that most women—even if they believe that pornography use is okay for other people—see no acceptable role for porn within their own committed relationship. [60] And no wonder! The evidence that porn can harm relationships and partners is overwhelming. [61]

The fact is, porn reshapes expectations about sex and attraction by presenting an unrealistic picture. In porn, women always look their best. They are forever young, surgically enhanced, airbrushed, and Photoshopped to perfection. [62] So it’s not hard to see why, according to a national poll, six out of seven women believe that porn has changed men’s expectations of how women should look. [63]

11. Porn Can Warp A Healthy View Of Sex

While porn is often called “adult material,” many of its viewers are well under the legal age. [65] In fact, the majority of teens are getting at least some of their sex ed from porn, whether they mean to or not. [66]

Researchers are finding that porn’s influence can and does find its way into teenager’s sexual behaviors. [67] For example, people who have seen a significant amount of porn are more likely to start having sex sooner and with more partners, to engage in riskier kinds of sex that put them at greater risk of getting sexually transmitted infections, and to have actually contracted an STI. [68]

Sociologist Dr. Michael Kimmel has found that men’s sexual fantasies have become heavily influenced by porn, [69] which gets awfully tricky when their partners don’t want to act out the degrading or dangerous acts porn shows. [70] As a result, men who look at pornography have been shown to be more likely to go to prostitutes, [71] often looking for a chance to live out what they’ve seen in porn. [72] In one survey of former prostitutes, 80% said that customers had shown them images of porn to illustrate what they wanted to do. [73]

12. Porn Is Inseparably Linked To Prostitution & Sex Trafficking

Defenders of pornography make the argument all the time, that no matter how a woman is treated in porn, it’s okay because she gave her consent. [74] In some cases it’s obvious when victims haven’t given consent, like when child pornography and human trafficking are involved. Pimps and sex traffickers often use porn to initiate their victims into their new life of sexual slavery, [75] and then they force their victims to participate in making new porn. [76]

“I’ve never received a beating like that before in my life,” said Alexandra Read after being whipped and caned for 35 minutes. “I have permanent scars up and down the backs of my thighs. It was all things that I had consented to, but I didn’t know quite the brutality of what was about to happen to me until I was in it.” [77]

We’re not claiming that all porn is non-consensual. We’re just pointing out that some of it is and some of it isn’t, and when you watch it there’s no way to know which is which.

So, would you buy from a company if you knew that some, but not all, of their products were made with child labor? Would you support a store that abused some, but not all, of their female employees?

How can it be ethical to say that “porn is okay because participants give their consent,” when we know for a fact that some—probably much more than you think—do not?

13. Porn Can Seriously Hurt Your Family & Personal Life

Study after study has shown that porn viewers are less stable in their relationships [78] and have higher rates of infidelity [79] and divorce. [80] They are also less committed to their partners; [81] less satisfied in their relationships, [82] and more cynical about marriage, love, and relationships in general. [83]

All of those factors can gradually eat away at the love, trust, and mutual respect at the core of any relationship. But porn has other effects that are not nearly so subtle, like the humiliation, abandonment, and betrayal that someone feels when their spouse’s porn habit is discovered. [84] (See How Porn Can Hurt Your Partner) Even if they don’t consider it technically cheating, it’s hard not to feel some sense of betrayal at learning their spouse has been using someone else’s body to get aroused. [85]

14. Porn Is Connected To Violence

Not all porn features physical violence, but even non-violent porn has been shown to have effects on viewers. The vast majority of porn—violent or not—portrays men as powerful and in charge; while women are submissive and obedient. [86] Watching scene after scene of dehumanizing submission makes it start to seem normal. [87] It sets the stage for lopsided power dynamics in couple relationships and the gradual acceptance of verbal and physical aggression against women. [88] Research has confirmed that those who watch porn (even if it’s nonviolent) are more likely to support statements that promote abuse and sexual aggression toward women and girls. [89]

But porn doesn’t just change attitudes; it can also shape actions. In 2016, a team of leading researchers compiled all the research they could find on the subject. [90] After examining twenty-two studies they concluded that the research left, “little doubt that, on the average, individuals who consume pornography more frequently are more likely to hold attitudes conducive [favorable] to sexual aggression and engage in actual acts of sexual aggression.”

15. Porn Is Changing To Be More Shocking & Hardcore Than Ever

As Internet porn grew more popular; it also turned darker, more graphic, and more extreme. With so much porn available, pornographers tried to compete for attention by constantly pushing the boundaries. [91] “Thirty years ago ‘hardcore’ pornography usually meant the explicit depiction of sexual intercourse,” writes Dr. Norman Doidge, a neuroscientist and author of The Brain That Changes Itself. “Now hardcore has evolved and is increasingly dominated by the sadomasochistic themes … all involving scripts fusing sex with hatred and humiliation.” [92] In our post-Playboy world, porn now features degradation, abuse, and humiliation of females in a way never before seen in the mass media. [93] “[S]oftcore is now what hardcore was a few decades ago,” Doidge explains. “The comparatively tame softcore pictures of yesteryear … now show up on mainstream media all day long, in the pornification of everything, including television, rock videos, soap operas, advertisements, and so on.” [94]

Why This Matters

All of these issues show why we’re raising awareness and shining a light on the immense, measurable harms of porn. Don’t fall into the trap of believing that porn is harmless entertainment that has no effect on individuals or society. Get educated and fight against an industry that is tangibly harming individuals, relationships, and society. We deserve better than what porn has to offer. We deserve real love, untainted by the toxicity of pornography. Join this global fight for love and become a Fighter.

What YOU Can Do

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[50] Perry, S. (2016). Does Viewing Pornography Reduce Marital Quality Over Time? Evidence From Longitudinal Data. Archives Of Sexual Behavior, 46(2), 549-559. Doi: 10.1007/S10508-016-0770-Y (Porn Consumption Was The Second Most Predictive Factor. The Most Predictive Factor Was The “Lagged-Dependant Variable” Which Is A Statistics Term We Probably Couldn’t Explain Even If We Wanted To.)

[70] Rothman, E. F., Kaczmarsky, C., Burke, N., Jansen, E., & Baughman, A. (2015). “Without Porn…I Wouldn’t Know Half The Things I Know Now”: A Qualitative Study Of Pornography Use Among A Sample Of Urban, Low-Income, Black And Hispanic Youth. Journal Of Sex Research, 52(7), 736-746. Doi:10.1080/00224499.2014.960908; MacKinnon, C. A. (2005). Pornography As Trafficking. Michigan Journal Of International Law 26(4), 999–1000. Retrieved From Http://Repository.Law.Umich.Edu/Mjil/Vol26/Iss4/1; Raymond, J. (2004). Public Hearing On The Impact Of The Sex Industry In The EU, Committee On Women’s Rights And Equal Opportunities Public Hearing At The European Parliament. New York: Coalition Against Trafficking In Women.

[71] Monto, M. A. (1999). Focusing On The Clients Of Street Prostitutes: A Creative Approach To Reducing Violence Against Women. Paper Submitted To The U.S. Department Of Justice.

[72] Malarek, V. (2009). Johns: Sex For Sale And The Men Who Buy It. New York: Arcade, 193–96;MacKinnon, C. A. (2005). Pornography As Trafficking. Michigan Journal Of International Law 26(4), 999–1000. Retrieved From Http://Repository.Law.Umich.Edu/Mjil/Vol26/Iss4/1; Raymond, J. (2004). Public Hearing On The Impact Of The Sex Industry In The EU, Committee On Women’s Rights And Equal Opportunities Public Hearing At The European Parliament. New York: Coalition Against Trafficking In Women.

[77] Collective Shout (2014, July 24) The Sex Factor: Mainstreaming And Normalising The Abuse And Exploitation Of Women. Retrieved From Http://Www.Collectiveshout.Org/The_sex_factor_mainstreaming_and_normalising_the_abuse_and_exploitation_of_women

[91] Woods, J. (2012). Jamie Is 13 And Hasn’t Even Kissed A Girl. But He’s Now On The Sex Offender Register After Online Porn Warped His Mind. Daily Mail (U.K.), April 25.

[93] DeKeseredy, W. (2015). Critical Criminological Understandings Of Adult Pornography And Women Abuse: New Progressive Directions In Research And Theory. International Journal For Crime, Justice, And Social Democracy, 4(4) 4-21. Doi:10.5204/Ijcjsd.V4i4.184